Falling Away With You
by Odyssion
Summary: Matsumoto sometimes wishes, more than anything, that she had held on for a second longer.


**Falling Away with You**

_Disclaimer:_ This is a purely non-profit story written for entertainment purposes only. I do not own Bleach.

_Author's Notes:_ Set after the whole Shouta/Yui business. To be honest, I couldn't stand the kid, but I can see what his character was supposed to do in terms of character development (of the others). I've been meaning to write an introspective piece on Matsumoto for quite a while, so this was just a good opportunity to try it. Again, title is inspired by a Muse song. If you read all the lyrics of this song, I think you'll find it's more than fitting for her character. This isn't meant to be romance (especially not between Hitsugaya and Matsumoto), but I suppose everything is open to interpretation.

* * *

She watches the sun set in an explosion of colour, and somehow the distance toward the horizon has never seemed so beautiful. The chill of night tugs insistently at her gigai as if in warning, but the first specks of stars have dotted the inky blackness of the sky and she is too caught up in her thoughts to notice.

Shouta's words still ring so loudly in her ears. Until they had met him, she had been able to focus on the task at hand, able to quell the questions that came whenever she thought too deeply of the past or future. Friendship, desertion, guilt… had he felt guilty, she wonders, as he made his secret plans to destroy their world? She comforts herself with affirmation, but she can hardly persuade herself to believe that she knows him fully anymore. Shouta, in his childish innocence, had brought back so much of what she had admired – and could not understand – in Gin.

"Matsumoto."

She turns at the sound of a voice that is much wiser than its years.

"Captain. What are you still doing up so late?"

He walks the distance of the shingles toward her perch, sitting down carefully on the slanted surface. Hitsugaya looks weary and much older than his years.

"I couldn't sleep," he answers simply, and she nods along. The silence engulfs them.

"Captain…" This bridge is treacherous, but she knows its crossing is long overdue. "You should have told me… you should've told me your suspicions about Gin when Aizen first disappeared."

His gaze is skyward but she can feel his immense scrutiny of her simply by their proximity. "Yes, perhaps I should have." Until he lets out this phrase, she didn't realize how tense she had been as she feels the anxiety slip from her body. "But there are some things we find hard to accept about those we care about."

His insightfulness startles her until she realizes that he is not referring only to her but to himself also. She thinks back on Hinamori's face, contorted with pain and denial, and fully appreciates for the first time how much her captain puts her feelings in perspective. No, if he had told her, she might today be in a similar state as Hinamori.

"Hinamori might never return to normal," he says quietly, as if reading her thoughts. What she doesn't know is his conversation with Hinamori through the communicator, her tearful and almost maniacal insistence that Aizen was coerced. "But she never made the choice to be how she is now."

His words stop her cold and she cannot help the hint of anger that flashes through her body. Hitsugaya looks empathetically at his second-in-command and knows that this is a question she must inevitably ask herself.

"Could you do it?"

And Matsumoto would like more than anything to feign ignorance, to pretend that she misses his point and laugh it off by saying she can do anything, but the gravity of the truth stops these lies deep in her throat. She knew that the prospect of battling Gin – of killing him – was something she would have to face, and that she would have to make up her mind before the decisive battle began. Her captain wasn't trying to be cruel; this was, ironically, an act of kindness.

While she sits in shock and tries to formulate a response, Hitsugaya has stood and walked back toward the window. As he turns, he tosses a small parcel her way.

"Here. It's an early birthday present." She catches the foil-wrapped box in her hands and turns it over gently. Her whole body is shaking as she tears open the package.

It would be her first birthday without Gin. It would be her only birthday without Gin.

Inside she finds a pretty little bracelet that she has been eyeing every time they pass a certain store on the way to the Urahara shop. She slips it on her wrist and wonders if it will be enough because, deep down, she sometimes wishes more than anything that she had held onto him for a second longer.

Tonight when she goes to sleep he is there, holding a blade to her Captain's throat. And for the first time since she has known him, Gin apologizes.

-----

_And I feel my world crumbling_

_And I feel my life crumbling down_

_I can feel my soul crumbling away…_

_And falling away, falling away_

_With you._

_-- Muse, Falling Away with You_

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**End**


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